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HauntedIllinois.com's

2016 Scarytown Scream Park Review

Scarytown Scream Park19511 Lembcke RdHarvard, IL 60098

Reviewed By:

The Gatecreeper

Visibility / Location:

The GPS and Google maps took us to Plum Tree National Golf Course, where the event is held. Their website also states the location. We approached and saw a large wood sign in the streetlight with the words "Haunted House" Spray painted on it. Just passed that there was a vehicle with a flashing light and he directed us to pull in continue forward and follow the road to the clubhouse. The guide at the entrance also mentioned that there where were two trails to experience which would take a total of forty minutes combined.

Parking is on the right and the haunt is on the left passed the clubhouse. We found parking, which seemed limited, there were no lights so it was hard to tell how much parking was available. We walked past the clubhouse where some actors were talking to each other and found the ticket booth easily down the path near the rear of the clubhouse, it was brightly lit.

Wait Entertainment:

The night we went there was no line. There was no wait entertainment. It was a Friday. The hours for the evening were 7:30pm to Midnight. When we got there to purchase tickets we were informed that the actors were taking a break so we were invited into the clubhouse where refreshments and food was made available. There were no menus posted, but we saw a chip rack and pizza in a warming rotisserie. The person behind the bar offered soft drinks, water, or beer. We were thirsty and had a cola, and informed that it wouldn't be long since the actors would be off of break soon.

After some time we noticed the actors coming from upstairs and going out the main door to their spots. We waited a little longer for them to get situated. We went back to the ticket booth to purchase our tickets. We were told only one trail was open for the evening. The other trail (Camp Zombie) was closed prior to our arrival for the rest of the evening, due to some of the actors having to go home. We waited a few more minutes out of courtesy and knew more actors were setting up since we saw all the flashlights on the trail ahead of us and a gator had just entered the trail. So we waited for the path to be clear.

$30 All Park Access Pass. Includes all three events.
$50 highway to Hell Pass. Includes all three events with skip the line privileges.

Parking:

Free

Event Length:

18.5 Minutes

LPR:

LPR Score = 1.382

LPR stands for Length/Price Ratio. It represents perceived value of an event, by
comparing
length vs price of admission. Higher numbers represent more value per dollar. Actual
quality and/or entertainment value of an event are not factors in this calculation.
Click Here
to see how this event compares to others
visited this year by the staff of HauntedIllinois.com.

Scare Factor:

Very Low

Crowd Control:

There were no other groups that night that we know of. There was no need to control the flow of our experience for that evening.

Summary:

We entered the trail, and came to a checkpoint where the ticket taker and security staff were positioned. We were informed that it will be a few more minutes before they would be ready. A total of fifty three minutes had passed since we had left our vehicle, before we were able to enter the attraction. After the basic rules were given we were told to stay on the path and for any reason if we needed to use our cell phones for illumination (if we strayed off the path) it would be acceptable. The path and haunt was in a field and the walking route was cut short while the rest of the landscape had longer grass blades. Under the low dim light this was helpful and easy to identify under our feet to prevent us from getting lost.

The path had been marked loosely by lights on the ground. We walked for a few minutes and were approaching a large amount of crosses around us as the path made a right turn. Ahead we saw a lit up scene; it was a graveyard with headstones. We walked passed expecting a scare or a few actors, but it was just a scene. Walking forward we saw another graveyard scene and more lights powered by a generator. We witnessed the same as before, nothing but the scene of a graveyard. We went up a small incline and saw an actor approaching us, this may have been a false alarm. When we got closer to the actor he looked at us and moved over to the side and got closer to the tree line to avoid us. Continuing on the curved path we met with four more actors. One of the shorter ones growled at us, as another asked if we were lost. A third stepped in front of me and asked where I was going, I replied "forward" and went around the actor, and they continued on their path away from us. About thirty feet ahead there were large plywood structures and we heard some banging. We followed the path and saw a white body form drop to the ground. As we turned to follow the path fifteen more feet, we noticed thick grass under us. We had to use the light from our phones to see we were off the path and had to correct ourselves. We found where we needed to be and continued on.

We forged on for maybe five to seven minutes, and saw a bridge ahead. The nearby trees were up lit in green and purple, and we had hopes we were in store for an encounter or rehearsed scene. As we approached the bridge another actor met up with us and stared while snarling. On the bridge now we saw another three actors one of them looked at us and said "Oh, we did not hear you coming, sorry". As we passed them and crossed the bridge we were left somewhat confused and wondered if any of these actors were given any guidance on what they were supposed to be doing.

Walking on the path for another six to seven minutes we lost the path twice, trying to stay close to the dim lights placed on the ground but they were placed so far apart that they would disappear behind the uneven ground. We used our phones one last time to find a path. We saw a paved path and took that. We walked and saw the ticket booth ahead and knew we were on the correct path. As we came closer to the exit we saw a man walking toward us and he had a translucent mask backlit with LED's on what seemed to be an eight foot pole. Waving the stick above his head to attempt to give the illusion that the ghost face was floating. As we exited we noticed another LED marker off to the side of us and asked if this was the exit or was the light off to the side the correct exit? He did mention to us and said that was the exit, but it's OK. We were invited back next week when they will have the Big Top Terror up by then and will be the scariest attraction compared than the other two. We walked out of the trail and did notice the lights being turned off near the entrance of the paths, and the string lighting on the ticket booth, this was happening fifteen minutes prior to their posted closing time.

As a reminder for this review, we visited on the second to last weekend of Halloween, but only two out of the three events they advertised were operating and they closed one of those early.

We will most likely not return in the future unless I hear from a trusted source that ScaryTown is back in full swing and operating as it's advertised.